8 thoughts on “Senators at orientation”

I’ll admit it’s a subjective matter of taste that they look silly — although they do — but it’s an objective matter of recognizing the obvious that they’re styled nearly identically to each other. And, that looks silly in its own way, just like teenagers in high school going through a fad, dressing identically.

No Margot, it is not sexist to simply notice things about the way women are packaged and presented, and read things into it. If that were the case you wouldn’t be on very solid ground to criticize anyone over said sexism, since your blog here is about, arguably, very little apart from that very thing.

I’m still very much on board with your personal battle against brands and institutions plying messages upon young people that limit their lifetime amibitions, essentially limiting those children as people. We have a common enemy there. But here, we have an example where you see a remedy against this in the form of female power figures decking themselves out to be as unfeminine as possible; whereas, to me, it’s more of the same. But, interestingly, you choose to use this “sexist” word to browbeat me into backing off from an opinion I’m going to have, guaranteed, nevermind whether I’m denied the privilege of expressing it (and I’m certainly not alone in having it). Which reveals a very ugly aspect about this thing we’ve been calling “feminism”: It isn’t concerned with equality, in some ways it’s concerned with certain classes of the few, dictating the tastes of the many, while certain OTHER classes of people aren’t even allowed to have an opinion. So, let’s just avoid the name-calling, agree to disagree on this one, and I’ll look forward to seeing what you have to say about other things.

But, male or female, I want my leaders in Washington to have accumulated some life experiences so they can make wise decisions. The picture you’ve posted looks, to a lot of people, like the polar opposite of this: Typical bureaucrats accustomed to working in tiny cloisters, making decisions impacting people they’ll never meet, not knowing what they’re doing. I’m a gun owner in California, forced to abide by laws that gun owners know are not good laws, made by non-gun-owners. So it’s pretty well established how this leads to bad results, and sex doesn’t have a lot to do with it. In fact, in a lot of ways, safe and effective gun ownership IS a woman’s issue…but that’s only just one aspect of it. I think you’re a California resident yourself, so you probably understand there are many others to be encountered, without leaving our state.

This is so sexist! They don’t look silly. Once again, men always “look alike.” Their haircuts, suits, and shirts. What about men in tuxedos for God’s sake? You’re just socialized to it. I can’t keep on with this thread. It is too ridiculous.

I’ve already addressed that. When men dress alike in the way they describe, they do not diminish their masculinity, and when those two dress alike, they do diminish their femininity. This gets into a difference of opinion you and I have in which, from what I’ve been able to pick up about it, you seem to think some sort of new enlightenment is available to us if we mute down this difference between the sexes…the French have a phrase for this, vive la différence. Whether or not you think that is “so sexist,” I don’t know, but you’re probably not going to change my mind about it.

At any rate, to repeat, there’s nothing sexist about noticing the messages being put out in the presentation of females and pondering what the message might be, through its effect and intent. If there WERE something sexist about it, you Margot would be among the last who would be able to criticize anyone about it.

The picture is cool because its two women senators, walking together and talking together. You rarely see images of 2 women in power, looking psyched to be in power, collaborating. I love the half smiles and the way you can see them thinking, looking excited to act.

The analogy doesn’t hold because when male senators walk & talk together, dressed alike, they very strongly resemble men I would see just about anywhere else. Provided that the everymens’ wardrobe expense accounts are sufficiently generous they can afford to dress like senators, anyway. Granting that one condition, the senators & non-senators would be practically indistinguishable.

The point here is, to be an emblem of feminine power, a woman first has to look feminine (just as your male senators I’m sure would make some motion toward looking somewhat masculine). Now these two, to the contrary, seem to be expending so much energy in the opposite direction that they end up copying each other…and in a fashion statement that, no, it isn’t what you see elsewhere on an everyday basis.

It is an elephant-in-the-room. Which, as you so ably pointed out, we are somehow obliged to avoid noticing, lest we be labeled sexist. Yeah…uh, I don’t think that’s going to fix the economy.

So what’s the answer to my Sarah Palin question? What if Mia Love won, what about when Michelle Bachmann won…does it not count when women win elections, if they aren’t extremist liberals?

Are you kidding me? You’re saying that Baldwin and Warren don’t look like women you’d see anywhere else because of their clothing and haircuts? Where do you live? Work? Travel? There’s no elephant in the room Morgan. I already wrote what was cool about the photo. I thought that was obvious, but apparently not.

Your Sarah Palin question? Wasn’t that about Palin’s outfit as well? Her skirt and heels?

Some of the new women senators I posted a photo of after election day are conservative and pro-life. Also, there are men are feminists and women who are not.

Like I wrote, I thought it was a cool photo of two women in power excited to change the world together– a photograph that captured a moment in time.